Imposter System

After washing up, Matt left the bathroom feeling refreshed. He could feel the new powers instinctually and understood how they worked. This was a lot different than how it was when he first started to gain skills. By simply infiltrating someone's dream and being a spectator or participant, his mental strength would increase by five percent. However, if the increase in his mental strength exceeds the total mental strength of the dreamer, he won't get any improvements.

Due to this, his skill wouldn't exponentially grow his mental strength, he would only be as strong as the lifeform he chose to live amongst. Matt smiled and thought about Willard. His mental strength must be quite high because of his powers. Although he wanted to kill him, there were many benefits to keeping him alive.

First, Willard was useful as a blood bag. With his abilities, there was a high chance that his blood would give an incredible ability to Matt or Alexis. Secondly, with his mental strength, it would take long for Matt to reach his peak of mental strength. Based on some quick math, he would need to be twenty times stronger than Willard before Matt's growth stopped. And the final reason is information and technology. It would be foolish to kill someone as smart as Willard. If he could be permanently hypnotized in the future, he would become a valuable asset for Matt.

[Weak Hypnosis Lv. 2: Whenever you make eye contact with someone, they will be more inclined toward whatever you say and believe your words to hold more weight than others. The influence of those words lasts even after eye contact has been broken.

]Hypnosis: Intermediate]

[Hypnosis

Activation: Eye contact

Duration: Special

Proficiency: Intermediate (82/100)]

Matt brought the skill up in his mind. He hadn't looked at it in a while and was happy to see the number had already gotten so high. Using it on Alexandria several times was able to net him quite a few points. Although she seemed very easy to deal with, it turned out that she was quite stubborn. Without his hypnosis, he couldn't imagine how difficult she would've been to deal with her.

Matt was excited to reach the next stage of his Hypnosis ability and wondered what the conditions to evolve it would be. Ideally, it would only need several points. However, because it is the core skill of this evolution line, it may not allow him to spend points as a shortcut. Therefore, he set a goal for himself. If the next stage required proficiency as well, he would use the whole four days of the wedding to max it out.

Since a lot of high-level figures would be there, it should be simple to mess with their heads. Hypnosis does take some mental strength to use, but Matt's recent advancements should make it negligible. Matt wished he had marked Willard when he had the chance. Fortunately, although Alexis's mental strength wasn't as high as Willard's, she was still very strong. The next few nights, he would have pleasant dreams with her when he wasn't interrogating the doctors.

'Hmm, if she can unlock this ability as well, we could infinitely get stronger. There should be a biological limit, but reaching that by spring boarding off each other is like cheating. I like it.'

While in deep thought, Alexis had since woken up and had a shower. She walked around in her underwear and a towel over her shoulders. Since she had to get dressed formally later, she decided to not bother putting on other clothes. Seeing Matt completely distracted by his thoughts, she snuck up on him. He would occasionally smile or frown, and watching him was fun for her.

Just as she tried to jump him from behind, he turned. "Trying to sneak up on me?"

Alexis jumped because she didn't expect him to notice. Matt's awareness had grown significantly, so even when he was completely distracted, somethings were still perceivable by him. Depressed that she couldn't catch him off guard, she walked around the side of the couch and sat on his lap. She tried to get comfortable and squirmed around on purpose to mess with Matt.

"What are you thinking about so intensely this morning?" She asked.

"Just what will I do with such a pretty, smart wife by my side?" He said while hugging her from behind. Matt rubbed her stomach and could feel the bump starting to form on her previously flat belly. "How are you feeling?"

"Hmm I'm a bit hungrier than usual. I was playing around with my meal plan and managed to get quite a bit more food allocated to me."

"That's good. I'll go pick up breakfast for us in a bit, just stay here and relax." However, he didn't make any moves to get up. Matt stayed with Alexis like that for a while until he heard her stomach rumble. He gave her an awkward smile and left right away.

While walking back, Matt thought about how much his original plans deviated. When he first got here, his intention was to simply keep a few people close to him and not make any significant impacts. However, his previous self was truly a genius at laying down land mines. Unfortunately, Matt was never good at minesweeper.

Although he was forced down a path, he had many choices along the way and didn't regret any of them. Matt only realized now that if he didn't open himself up to Alexis, he would truly be alone. Perhaps he may have even teamed up with Willard to strangle this ship and bring it to its knees. His path would be much darker and much lonelier.

When he asked Willard the truth of why he was doing this, Matt assumed it was a ploy to answer the way he did. However, thinking about it, he may have only covered up the deeper truth with another truth. Without Alexis, he would be broody, edgy, and frankly, way too suspicious. For someone that has played many games in his past life, the guy acting weird is always the first to get called out, even if he's just like that normally.

Willard was probably very lonely on this ship. Matt furrowed his brow and wondered. The relationship between Scorch and Willard must be very bad if Willard feels lonely. However, why did Scorch have access to the server with the contacts? Matt always assumed that, since Willard was public enemy number one, then Scorch must also be his enemy. But something just didn't make sense.

Matt took out the container for the contacts which he kept in his bag. He put one in and closed the other eye. The private chat came up and the last message was still Alexis's keyboard spam when she was taken and Scorches blank message. Matt put away the contact and stuffed the container back in his bag. However, he noticed something that he had forgotten about. After the situation with cyborg Cindy was taken care of, he had stopped thinking about it.

At the bottom of his pack was an envelope. Since it was ignored and left alone, it had crumpled up slightly. He pulled it out and wondered. Matt backtracked to a service closet and entered it. When he opened the envelope, he discovered two things. A very advanced piece of information storage which resembled the thumb drives of his era and a letter.

"If you're reading this, then you've either resolved your questions or have too many to count. The person whom you knew as Cindy has already died. What is in that room is only a shell with her memories. As for the location of the room, that is up to you to find. What you need to know is that Shepherd is very dangerous. The reason is because Shepherd is just a puppet to an even scarier opponent. You once asked me who Willard Nilsson was, and my words to you were slightly incorrect. He is not someone that can be your ally. For Willard, the only thing he knows is isolation and solitude. Any attempts at friendship or teamwork will only result in your loss. Don't believe his silly façade. Willard is completely emotionless.

-Scorch

P.S. If you wish to defeat Shepherd, insert that Universal Drive into the main controlling unit."

Matt read over the letter twice to make sure he didn't miss anything and then smacked his lips. If only he hadn't forgotten about this envelope. Although a lot of the information wasn't necessary anymore, there were still some details that stood out to him. Scorch and Willard weren't close. They may even be enemies.

And this thumb drive apparently could defeat Shepherd. That means, Scorch knows his true identity. Which means Scorch also knows that Willard is the creator of the Shepherd program. Scorch had tried to guide him away from this since the beginning, so it seemed that Scorch was really his ally. He thought about the contacts and realized that Scorch must have done something to them. In order to protect him, Scorch has done quite a bit behind the scenes.

'Damn, and here I thought I was surviving because of my own efforts. I was being protected in the dark.'